There are whole industries around that. Getting paid to relate is basically what teachers, trainers, coaches, therapists etc. do all day.

People could learn things on their own but still pay teachers

There are actually a lot of professions that either directly or indirectly rely on that. For example, therapists and social workers of many stripes, actors, writers, musicians, etc benefit directly from that, for at least some sub-disciplines/genres. Indirectly, almost every job where you interact with others directly to provide a service or sell a product (which is many, many things, and more than might first come to mind).

I doubt most people will be developing a rapport with an AI agent trying to sell you that contract at work, or helping you when you're irate and have escalated a problem a few times.

i dont meant to come across as too harsh, but that is something that you will have to figure out. if companies are less inclined to give salaries for technical skills, then its on us to figure out how our current skill sets become marketable.

even the job of freelance engineer is customer relation. how good are you at extracting product requirements? understanding a clients workflows? these take relational skills and are often what freelancers are paid for, beyond the ability to produce code.

It's about as specific as we can get atm I guess. I have no idea, I just know we VALUE human connection, there is unique human value in it. We value each-other.

Maybe we just sit around campfires and tell stories as the billionaires warm their hands on their burning data centers.

Don't forget that everything anybody owns is just a system we invented, my house, my garden, only a piece of paper that we all accept keep others from it.

We can reinvent ourselves. Idk, to me this is a comforting thought. But I agree it's still lacking. It's not simple, discussing things online helps develop language and vision around it.